and the Gringo froze, their food-laden forks halfway between plate and mouth.
‘If you don’t mind,’ said the Reverend.
‘Go ahead.’
The Reverend clasped his hands and rested them on the edge of the table. Leni did the same and lowered her eyes. Tapioca looked at the Gringo and the guests, then put his hands together too. Brauer’s remained apart, one on either side of his plate.
‘Lord, bless this food and this table. Thank you, Jesus, for giving us the opportunity to meet these friends. Praised be thy name.’
The Reverend smiled.
‘Okay,’ he said.
The four of them dug into the food: lots of rice and a few pieces of cold meat left over from last night’s dinner. They were all hungry, so for a while there was only the sound of the cutlery against the enamelled plates. Tapioca and Brauer ate in a rush, as if they were racing to see who would finish first. The Reverend and Leni were slower. He had taught her that it was important to chew your food well before swallowing: good chewing is an aid to good digestion.
‘Have you been living here long?’ Pearson asked.
‘Fair while,’ said the Gringo, swallowing and wiping his mouth with the back of his hand before taking a gulp of wine chilled with ice. ‘This was my father’s place. I wandered around for years and years, working in the cotton gins, harvesting, whatever I could find. Going from one place to another. Must have been about ten years ago I settled down here for good.’
‘It’s a lonely sort of place.’
‘I don’t mind being alone. Anyway, now I’ve got Tapioca for company, haven’t I, kid?’
‘Have you been working with Mr Brauer for long?’
Tapioca shrugged his shoulders and wiped his plate with a piece of bread, leaving it spotlessly clean.
‘My assistant’s a bit shy,’ said the Gringo. ‘Until he gets to know people, right, kid?’
The mechanic finished eating, crossed his knife and fork, and leaned back in his chair with his hands on his swollen abdomen.
‘And what about you? You said you were heading for Castelli?’
‘Yes. We’re going to see Pastor Zack. Do you know him?’
‘Zack. Don’t think so.’ The Gringo lit a cigarette. ‘I knew a Zack, when I was a kid, working at Pampa del Infierno. But he was no man of God, that guy. A Russian, a rough sort. A fighter. Always getting into trouble. There are lots of evangelists around here.’
‘Yes, there are many Protestant churches in the area. Ours has grown considerably over the last few years, thanks be to God. Pastor Zack has done wonderful work.’
They sat there in silence. Brauer finished his wine and swirled the last little pieces of ice around in the bottom of the glass.
‘Even if he doesn’t believe, your friend, the one you were talking about, he too can enter the Kingdom of Heaven. We all can,’ said the Reverend.
‘What’s it like?’ asked Tapioca, avoiding the Reverend’s eye.
‘The Kingdom of Heaven?’
‘Come here, I will show you the bride, the wife of the Lamb,’ said Leni, butting in. They all looked at her: she’d hardly said a word since getting out of the car. ‘And he carried me away in the Spirit to a great and high mountain, and showed me the holy city, Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, having the glory of God. Her brilliance was like a very costly stone, as a stone of crystal-clear jasper. It had a great and high wall. The material of the wall was jasper; and the city was pure gold. The foundation stones of the city wall were adorned with every kind of precious stone. The street of the city was pure gold, like transparent glass. Then the angel showed me a river of the water of life, clear as crystal, coming from the throne of God and of the Lamb, in the middle of its street. On either side of the river were the trees of life, yielding their fruit every month; and the leaves of the trees were for the healing of the nations.’ She smiled. ‘That’s how it goes, isn’t it, Father?’
‘Is that all true?’ asked Tapioca, astonished by the description.
‘Of course not. It’s metaphorical,’ Leni replied with a sneer.
‘Elena,’ said the Reverend severely. ‘The Kingdom of Heaven is the most beautiful place you can imagine, son. Standing in the grace of God. All the treasures in the world put together couldn’t compare with that. Are you a believer, Mr Brauer?’
The Gringo poured himself some more wine and lit another cigarette.
‘I don’t have time for that stuff.’
The Reverend smiled and held his gaze.
‘Well, I don’t have time for anything else.’
‘To each his own,’ said Brauer, getting up. ‘Clear the table, kid.’ Tapioca was sitting there lost in thought, rolling little pellets of bread and arranging them in a row.
The boy had arrived with his mother, one afternoon. He would have been about eight. They came in a truck that had picked them up in Sáenz Peña. The driver, who was heading to Rosario, filled up with petrol, checked the tyre pressure and ordered a beer. While he was drinking it in the shade of the awning and the boy was playing with the dogs, the woman came over to Brauer, who was cleaning the spark plugs of a car that he had to repair. When he saw her approaching, he thought she must be looking for the washroom; he had barely noticed her until then.
But it wasn’t the washroom she was after, it was something else.
‘I want to talk with you.’
Brauer glanced at her and went on with his work. She was hesitating; he thought she must be a prostitute. It wasn’t unusual for long-haul truckers to take them from one place to another, and wait around while they turned a trick. Maybe they split the money after.
She was hesitating, so the Gringo said:
‘I’m listening.’
‘You don’t remember me, do you?’
Brauer looked at her more carefully. No, he didn’t remember her.
‘It doesn’t matter,’ she said. ‘We knew each other a long time ago, and not for long. Thing is, that’s your son.’
The Gringo put the spark plugs in a jar and wiped his hands on a rag. He looked to where she had pointed.
The boy was holding a branch. He was using it to play tug-of-war with one of the dogs; the others were circling him and jumping, impatient for their turn to play.
‘They don’t bite, do they?’ she asked, anxiously.
‘No, they don’t bite,’ Brauer replied.
‘Thing is, I can’t go on raising him. I’m going to Rosario to look for work; it’s harder with the kid. I still don’t know where I’ll end up. There’s
